For the junkies

October 18th, 2012, 6:00pm by Sam Wang

I smell change in the air. Also, polls are much more frequent. For example, the Meta-Margin has been jumping around today, with a bit of a trend toward Obama. So…Andrew F. has added two new daily updates to the Meta-Analysis. The schedule is now: 8AM, 10AM, noon, 3PM, 5PM, 8PM.

Neuroscience note: Rewards are most effective at shaping behavior if they are given intermittently (which maintains their unexpected nature). For example, a rat will learn to press a lever repeatedly if something tasty comes out sometimes rather than always.

Well, let’s talk about that. Yes, you should not take any one poll as gospel, for any number of reasons. Random error, house effect, and the probability that you will, subconsciously or not, begin to discount polls unfavorable polls and trumpet favorable results.

This especially goes for national polls, which have a higher volume than any single state, and thus providing a reasonably good sample size of results.

But there have been only six polls conducted in Iowa during the month of October, and only eight in Wisconsin. (According to the Pollster database.) We’re basically starved for post-debate data at the state level, compared to the dozens of national surveys in the same timeframe.

Every little piece helps – as long as you’re looking at the picture itself.

For any of you running Google Chrome — you can install my Princeton Election extension, which puts a little icon in your browser that, when you click it, gives you the up-to-date Meta-Margin, Obama EV, Romney EV, the median-EV history graph and a link to Sam’s latest blog post. If you are the rat, this can be your lever.

I’m hoping to see more non-Rasmussen polls for other swing states tomorrow — Florida, New Hampshire, Virginia and North Carolina. An Arizona poll from someone other than Behavior Research Center would be nice too. I am also curious about Missouri.

The difference between the EV call at electoral-vote.com with and without Rasmussen data is 6 which move from Obama to toss-up. I am going to give up ragging on Rasmussen until I see a more convincing critique.

I’ve never been convinced by the claims that Rasmussen’s numbers are completely fraudulent, or that they skew them way Republican until late in the cycle and then tweak them to be accurate at the last minute to save their credibility. To me, it appears that they just use a somewhat-worse-than-usual weighting procedure that gives them a Republican house effect. But it hasn’t been huge this cycle.

I think a valid critique is that their practice of re-weighting the data to a model of the party breakdown of the electorate is not doing anything good. In practice, what it does is to just artificially damp out fluctuations, until such time as they update the party model.

I know Sam hates looking at individual polls, but I have a question about the Marist polls, specifically the new one from Iowa and the previous one from Ohio.

They say that in Iowa 34% of likely voters in their sample have already voted and another 11% plan to vote early. Since 36% of Iowans voted early in 2008, a total of 45% early voting this year is not implausible. However, according to Michael McDonald’s early vote tracking, the current early vote in Iowa as of today only equals about 18% of the 2008 total vote, which should presumably be roughly similar to the 2012 total vote. Moreover, the Marist poll was conducted Mon-Wed when the total was a little lower (though maybe some ballots were in the mail which would cancel out that effect somewhat.)

A similar question can be asked about the recent Marist Ohio poll, which said that around 20% of likely voters had already voted. At that time McDonald only showed about 5% the 2008 total vote in Ohio early voting . McDonald notes that his totals for Ohio are incomplete as some mainly smaller counties don’t update, but even so a factor of 4 is inexplicable.

So while as an Obama voter I hope the Marist polls are correct, I am curious as to how Marist would explain why their samples appear to contain more early voters than their really are.

I was wondering the same thing. Sam can you help us out on this? If more early voters are Obama supporters doesn’t that mean that these polls (please forgive me) are “skewed”? OMG I can’t believe I just said that…

When asked, there will always be more people who claim to have voted than actually did so. There are some areas where respondents will often lie to pollsters – this being one of them. Here’s a recent paper on the phenomenon:

Besides the mechanisms other commenters have given, it’s possible that their LV screen is actually undercounting likely voters who haven’t voted, which would make the people who already voted a larger fraction of the total.

I qualify as a victim of this operant conditioning. Not just for numbers but exciting blog posts. Rss just isn’t SATISFYING enough. I’ve had to add all the other sites to my quadrennial addiction to make sure and soak up every little detail.

Sam and others, how do you feel about people worrying/celebrating over Gallup’s recent polling results while ignoring that we still have an electoral college? Ohio, Nevada, Colorado, Iowa and Wisconsin ≠ the South.

It would be better if it were higher… As I understand it, it is the swing in opinion needed to change the winner.

I’m trying to understand the changes in the last update — predicted EV went down, but meta-margin went up. Does this mean a small state just moved significantly in Romney’s direction, but a larger state just moved more toward Obama?

1.46% is the swing towards Romney needed to produce an electoral college tie.

Polling results actually describe a range of results, with differing probabilities. For example, if a poll shows 50-47 for X-Y, with a margin of error of 3, then there is a 26.6% chance that the true value for X is 50%, and 40% that the true value for Y is 26.6%.

Same does this calculation for every state, using the recent polling data. He then uses that information calculate the probability that a candidate will win a particular state. He then uses *that* information to calculate the probability that a candidate will win N number of electoral votes.

The median result – combination of electoral votes – that cuts the probability distribution exactly in half – is the one displayed at the top of this site. If the election were held today, that’s the single most likely result.

So to produce a tie – a scenario where the median is 269 electoral votes for each candidate – would require a national shift of 1.46% in the popular vote.

Obviously, higher is better for Obama. 1.46% isn’t bad, but he peaked at about four times that number. The average has been about twice what it is now, so Sam expects him to continue to rebound somewhat.

Craigo- Are there typos here?
“Polling results actually describe a range of results, with differing probabilities. For example, if a poll shows 50-47 for X-Y, with a margin of error of 3, then there is a 26.6% chance that the true value for X is 50%, and 40% that the true value for Y is 26.6%. “

Look, billionaires are dropping 10,000,000 and 100,000,000 checks. To them this election and Karl Rove’s part of it is “an investment” — and they want a return. If the EV margin is a handful votes or less, then I wouldn’t be willing to bet my life savings on it not happening.

Speaking as a Democrat, I’d want to see it a lot higher before I’m convinced Obama is out of the woods. Romney’s ramping up to maximum ad blitz right now.

But don’t ignore the Congressional situation, certainly. If Obama loses, a Senate simple majority is the difference between passage and blockage of all the Ryan budget stuff, including repeal of Obamacare, voucherization of Medicare, etc.; it’s apparently constructed to go through the budget reconciliation process to be filibuster-proof.

Proof I’m a PEC junkie: I noticed right off which times were new. Speaking of salivating and swing states, Ohio has gone crazy. Paul Ryan did a scrub & dash photo op at the Youngstown St Vincent DePaul soup kitchen, and the surprising pushback now angry Republicans are people defunding thekitchen which feeds 100,000 meals a years. Maybe this election has driven me insane, but I melt down so easy now that I phoned Brian Antal who runs it and got him to agree to attach his email to paypal if a buck arrives at bantal@svdpusa.org . FWIW, you heard it here first. And don’t forget what started all this: Fund the party of your choice right here using Act Blue or the link below it, on the left margin of this PEC page .
Lastly, but most importantly, don’t fail to hear Sam Wang interviewed on NPR tomorrow- I think at 11:15 am West Coast Time, 2:15 Jerseyvote time.

Sam, anyone, do you agree with what Jersey Farmer says? I really would like info on how fast/slow info arrives here.
As for life decisions, I’m just trying to help until there’s no use and I’m off the hook.
My dad who is 85 takes a sardonic view of my efforts. And when one considers the billions being spent this week alone, versus my nillions, ok he’s likely right. But the impossible is really the most fun: if you fail, who can blame you? If the result suggests you may have succeeded, OMG! Like art (or the bad deal of gambling) Sam is so right about the endorphin pumping hook of intermittent rewards. My birthday is November 6th, and I want to share the joy of renewal with everyone.

Can someone explain to me how a poll of 500ish people in a national poll is representative? Let’s say there are 50 states :P and each made up 10 votes out of the 500…isn’t that subject to where those 10 landed? Were all 10 in NE Ohio or South Ohio? And what happens if 20 end up in California?

500 participants in a coutrywide landscape like we have, seems to have a very large margin or error, or am I missing something?

The budget reconciliation process is not subject to filibuster, and most of the Ryan Plan is sufficiently budgetary that it could be rammed through that way.

I’d guess that with a Romney presidency, a Republican House and a slim Republican majority in the Senate, we’d see much of Congress’s contentious legislative activity phrased somehow as budget bills so that it could go through reconciliation.

The polls don’t smell good for O. This was a very stable race till first debate with MM of +3 for Obama. The loss of MM from +6% to +1 to 1.5 % is very profound. The shift seems to be because of independents and college educated women.

If the MM doesn’t revert to say around +3% by this weekend, the shift is probably permanent. There is a very strong possibility R can prevail with up to 295 EVs if the loss college educated women from Obama’s coalition is deeper than what it is now. The polling numbers from rush belt indicate structural shift in voting coalitions not because of local factors (Wisconsin-Ryan, auto bailout-MI/OH etc). The campaign schedules indicate current battlegrounds are confined to just NV, CO, OH, IA and NH.

I also don’t buy the theory of swing states and national polling need not converge. Obama’s slide has been national and will eventually reach battleground states.

Ram, I’m here because there’s a measurable likelihood that Sam is onto something. See the 2008 site in the upper left margin. From what I’m learning here, a Romney win is a definite possibilty, but except by you, I havent seen it called a “strong possibility”. In the same way, many of your statement have an unusual twist. I dont know where you get your figures from, concerning what this weekend’s MM means. If the figures are off the top of your head, it would make more sense to ask questions than make declarations.

Ram: “I also don’t buy the theory of swing states and national polling need not converge. Obama’s slide has been national and will eventually reach battleground states.”

I think Ms Jay Sheckley (and Sam) are onto something.

But you have a point. In fact, in the next week-and-a-half, I think we will see the national and state-level polls converge — and to Obama’s advantage.

Yes, the first debate was catastrophic for him.

However, almost just as many people watched the second debate, where Obama clearly bettered Romney. More importantly, Barack Obama appeared presidential and totally in command.

And regarding women — Romney blew it. He told an extremely awkward story about “binders of women” that has become a national meme. (Check out http://bindersfullofwomen.com/) Worse: Romney’s story was proven a lie; this did not happen at his initiative.

Romney’s other debate answers on women’s issues and family issues are likely to neutralize his recent gains in this demographic. Heck, the former Governor of Massachusetts can’t even say he supports the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act — and his aides keep contradicting each other!

Ram, let’s agree on one thing: let us let the polls speak for themselves. Their story will soon become more clear.

Before discussing what Richard said, there’s an old Buddhist tale I like. A farmer is upset because his only son has broken his leg. “I’ll never get in the harvest” he tells an old monk, “This is terrible!” The monk says, “Maybe.”
Then suddenly the nation is at war. “This is terrible!” the farmer tells the monk. The monk nds and says “Maybe.” Then all the other men’s sons are conscripted into the army, but not his because his leg is broken. The farmer’s son on horseback directs women and children to bring in the finest harvest ever, and his yield and services are in high demand in a region struck by war, where others’ sons never came home. “This is wonderful!” says the farmer. Quoth the monk, Maybe.

Richard Vance’s own clever Saleman’s Tale beginning: “I agree.” ie alng with his Ram his take is also that essentially that things are terrible.

I empathize, my gut is much like yours. But in the Samland Funhouse, we peer into a strange and strangely calming world with _less_ distortion than our own.

How is it done? Slowly. Sam’s Looking Glass is carefully made so own narratives don’t come in with us. Here we see only what we can be most sure we know.

So we notice new true things.

Richard writes: “In the first debate[…Obama resuscitated Romney… RR got their foot into the door that should have been slammed shut.”

_Should_ is beyond the purview of fact and likelihood. Beforehand, we weren’t looking at Obama’s usual numbers, but at a number inflated by certain events and which were likely to return to a lower figure. More importantly, they’d already begun this downtick _before_ the first debate.

It’s well known that ALL debates give advantage to the challenger, as the levelish playing field makes him appear presidential or nearly so. The effect is heightened at the first debate, which tends to poll strongest.

It is _possible_ (I won’t call it true) that Obama had further to fall for several reasons:
– Romney had, unusually, no post-convention bounce, which inflated at least the appearance of the post DNC bounce,
-With the Akin incident so soon on the heels of his bill coauthor Ryan’s apearance and various other incidents, we did not see these numbers settle, but that is their tendency, or so I believe I’m learning.
– Obama _may_ have looked more presidential at his convention. Accepting the nomination, he didnt need to explain anything. Clinton and others did the explaining far less tediously than Obama is usually required to do. Who knows? There were so many factors! We should ask Sam

So the door was never slammed shut, whether or not it should have been. But it wasn’t Romney well-shined shoe that got in the door. The post DNC bounce down tick had ALREADY BEGUN before the first debate.

Well…. The narrative itself can contribute toward the narrative you posit. But the special thing here in Samland is we know that we don’t know yet. We wait and see.

We say, “Maybe.”

But Sam is likely better than maybe. There are statistical probabilities of certain outcomes based on the numbers we see today.

Sam points out the the simple fact that Obama has always been ahead. All races go up and down. Is it realistic to select the moment of greatest comfort as being a norm, yet simulaneously a state of grace from which we have fallen?

Nothing will unbreak the farmer’s son’s leg.
On the other hand, I too am concerned about the “coattail” races of the House and Senate. Some however, are doing nicely on their own! Poor Akin!

Tune in today at 2:15 Eastern time to hear Sam and another poll consolidator discussing their methods, algorithm and goals on NPR.

Just speculating here. The latest poll in the list (PPP) is labeled NEW by Pollster. Perhaps the prior six polls make up the group that was averaged. That includes another R+1 (Qinnipiac). Throwing out the two O+3’s and the two R+1’s leaves an O+2 and an R+1, whose average is O+0.5.

I think you are correct that it is using older numbers to retain a 0.5% in CO. I guess I’m not understanding when and how the margins are updated. Is the EV and Meta Margin using the latest numbers, while the power of your vote and state maps lag?

Senate filibuster can kill Romney overturning obamacare because is a supreme court decision.

And I believe they can’t take away medicare or SS or mortgage interest deduction.

A win on the top of the ticket and both houses may be able to destroy the student loan program.

Without the student loan program, our children cannot pay for the ridiculous price of a college tuition…especially the Romney position is to cut education, thus increasing the university prices significantly higher.

Let us not forget that either party could do away completely with the filibuster if that party has a simple majority of votes (and can command them all) and acts within the first two weeks of the new Senate session.

If the Democrats have 50 votes solid, with or without the “independents”, they can change the rules and eliminate filibusters. (Ditto for the Republicans, but despite their historical objections, it is doubtful they would do so now.)

Firstly, can anyone explain to me why the meta-margin isn’t at exactly Obama +2% right now? As far as I can tell, he’s up at least 2% in states worth over 270 EV, according to the “power of your vote” bar.

Second, how did the EV estimator decline from its position at 290 yesterday? No states seem to have flipped since then. I can understand a change in the confidence bands, but not the point estimate.

Third, why was Ohio still at 2% yesterday evening (18/10/12)? Taking all polls on Pollster with sample end dates from the 11th onwards gives Obama +3.5%. Does Sam use the date of publication rather than the sample dates?

As someone who follows this site regularly but is getting a little frustrated at these apparent anomalies (which are probably just me failing to understand the methodology), any answers would be much appreciated.

Regarding your second question: a state doesnt need to flip to have this effect. If a state drops from a 80% likelihood of an Obama win down to a 60 percent likelihood then when you calculate the chances of every possible electoral vote outcome, Obama will come out with a lower average ( and, more importantly, median) number of electoral votes.

Olav, a Republican House can decline to fund some of Obamacare. They can do that right now. Neither Obama nor Romney could force the House to appropriate funds the House refused to appropriate.

But, critically, there are large elements of Obamacare that don’t depend on federal budgeting. For example, the new rule that a young person can stay on their parent’s health coverage until the age of 26 isn’t a budgeting matter. So, no House funding action would not affect that. Similarly, the requirement that health insurers cannot turn anyone away because of preexisting health conditions isn’t a budgeting matter. Again, House funding action would not affect that.

So funding for Obamacare is important. But neither Romney nor a Republican House can simply undo it via use of the budget. This requires a Democratic Senate, of course. If the Republicans control both houses of Congress and the Presidency (and leaving the filibuster rule aside for the moment), then of course they could undo all of Obamacare.

I think this volatility in the polls is related to a rule of thumb I was told many years ago (1972). I was given a reference at the time, but I don’t remember what it was. The rule is that when the respondents to your poll fall below 10%, your numbers are no longer reliable.

Wikipedia cites Bradburn and Sudman (Asking Questions) as saying that the non-response error does not affect the margin of error, but the citation does not provide an original source for this conjecture.

I tried making the assumption that the ‘real’ set of respondents was related to being plus or minus the square root of the total sample set, but this grew large enough to be declared a problem long before the sample set was below 10%.

Hey Sam, love the site, and especially love the more frequent updates on the meta-margin. But I’d be surprised to hear that I was the only one wondering what prompted each fluctuation. Do you think you or Andrew might be able to give a quick blurb of justification, or at least give us a dump of all the date that *might* have caused each change?

Sam – I hear you, and I also hear you about ignoring the disparity and noise in all the polls out there, and that’s why I and so many others have become so dependent on the meta-margin. It’s just that the dependence and need for frequent updates comes from a need for understanding and sense, so anything you can do to help with that would be icing on the cake.

BF Skinner- Sorry, right, _reinforcers_: Like Facebook friends who agree with with one’s most arcane suspicions, not to mention the cure for cancer is being kept secret. My friends all agree! Damn you, scheming scientific journals! Some day we will take over Congress… Wait.